São Paulo Rd2 – Caruana crushes Karjakin, Carlsen beats Paco

by Albert Silver

9/26/2012 – The second round of São Paulo was no less exciting than the first, with drama and action. The first game to end was Anand-Aronian in a quiet draw, but this was merely the eye of the hurricane. After a slip in the opening by Karjakin, Caruana sacced two exchanges to win, and took the lead, while Carlsen beat Vallejo in a study-like endgame. Games, pictures and report by Albert Silver.

São Paulo / Bilbao Grand Slam Final

Round 2: Tuesday, September 25, 15:00h

Francisco Vallejo

0-1

Magnus Carlsen

Sergey Karjakin

0-1

Fabiano Caruana

Viswanathan Anand

½-½

Levon Aronian

Round two

Report and pictures by Albert Silver

Just adorable

The second round of the Grand Slam Masters in São Paulo was no less exciting than the first, and the organizers included numerous activities such as tournaments for children, to maximize the efforts to use the event as a promotional tool for chess.

"Hmmm.... does she think I am intimidated?"

Giant tournaments were organized with hundreds of children

The day also marked the arrival of Susan Polgar who joined Gilberto Milos at the commentary table.

Susan Polgar arrived to start the second round and give her expert commentary

When not in active competition, the audience was filled with rapt youth. They were
not merely being polite as I was asked by a
very young spectator to not block one
of the board monitors.

The first game to end was a fairly uneventful draw between Vishy Anand and Levon Aronian with neither allowing the other a chance to create any trouble, but soon the spectators would soon find that this was merely the eye of the hurricane.

Vishy Anand is still getting in gear after his three month layoff

It was a fairly uneventful game and they soon agreed to a draw

The game between Sergey Karjakin and Fabiano Caruana soon looked like a page from the Apocalypse, as the Italian took advantage of a mistake by the Russian to sneak in his bishop, and then blow his opponent’s position sky high with two successive exchange sacrifices to take it to the king.

Sergey Karjakin shows his most penetrating gaze

Whereas yesterday the young Italian was certainly quite lucky to walk home with the full point, this time the merit was all his as he attacked with great gusto for an attractive win. This also means that he is now the early leader with six points.

A deeply disappointed Sergey quickly explained that he made a mistake in the move
order before leaving the stage

The game between Francisco Vallejo-Pons and Magnus Carlsen was another affair entirely. The game started quite slowly giving Carlsen exactly the kind of endgame he likes. While promising, that still meant an early endgame, which is not usually the most exciting way to pursue the full point. That said, to squeeze out a win from what is objectively an equal endgame against a player in the world’s top 50 still smacks of black magic. The final winning maneuver with Bd3-Bf1-Bxg2-Bh3-Bf5 was worth an inclusion in endgame test books and future instruction manuals.

After his win, Carlsen ponders a move with Paco before joining the press conference

Albert SilverBorn in the US, he grew up in Paris, France, where he completed his Baccalaureat, and after college moved to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He was champion of Rio de Janeiro with a peak rating of 2240, and was a key designer of Chess Assistant 6. In 2010 he joined the ChessBase family as an editor and writer at ChessBase News.

See also

10/14/2012 – It wasn't for lack of playing in the final round, at least not for Magnus Carlsen. He may have played simply out of principle, but he was also playing for a place in history if he beat Aronian. No records fell, but he made no mistakes in his blitz tiebreak against the co-leader Fabiano Caruana, and took it 2-0 for yet another feather in his cap. Illustrated report with GM commentary.Discuss

10/12/2012 – It was long in the coming, and one knew that it was a matter of time before the new guard started scoring against the old. Today was the day as Magnus Carlsen finally broke the tie-streak and beat Vishy Anand after a hard tense battle. Caruana stays in the running as he beat Aronian after the Armenian made a speculative sacrifice that failed. Full report with analysis.Discuss

Discuss

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